The Central Bohemian Region selects the director. Then why are they afraid to show their own papers?

The selection process should be a symbol of fairness. Applicants submit documents, fulfill the conditions, appear before the commission, are evaluated according to pre-set rules, and the best should win. At least this is how the public imagines the process in which the region is looking for the director of its contribution organization. But the story of the selection process for the management of the Mladá Boleslav Senior Citizens' Home shows how quickly the simple question "who succeeded and why?" turn into clerical fog.

The selection process took place. Applicants were evaluated. There was a point system. The commission set the order. According to the Central Bohemian Region itself, one of the candidates was evaluated as the most suitable. But then there was an announcement that the selection procedure would be repeated. With no clear explanation as to why this happened. Without a clear description of what actually happened between the commission's meeting and the Central Bohemian Region Council's decision.

And this is where the story gets interesting.

When one of the applicants requested documents under the Freedom of Information Act to clarify the course and outcome of the proceedings, he did not ask any absurd questions. He didn't want the personal information of his competitors. He explicitly allowed their anonymization. Nor did he want officials to create new legal analyses. He wanted the existing documents: the report of the selection committee, his evaluation sheets, the final evaluation, the materials presented to the Regional Council and the records from which it is possible to find out how the decision to repeat the entire procedure was reached.

However, the county's response raised more questions than answers.

For example, the region announced that eight applicants were registered for the selection process. But the question was how many applicants actually participated in the selection process. That's not the same thing. Furthermore, the office confirmed that the commission compiled a list of candidates, that one of them was evaluated as the most suitable, but at the same time that it did not recommend any candidate for appointment. And to make the story even less clear, in the next paragraph there is a "selected candidate" who should have withdrawn from the selection process.

So who was actually chosen? Who was the best fit? Who was recommended? And if no one was recommended, how could there be a "selected candidate"?

Perhaps there is a perfectly logical explanation for this. This is even very possible. But that is precisely why there are minutes, evaluation sheets and documentation of selection committees. So that the public administration does not have to say: trust us. So that she can say: here are the documents, look.

But it was with the most interesting documents that a surprising answer came.

The region confirmed that the evaluation sheets exist. He confirmed that the assessment was point-based. He confirmed that a particular candidate scored 50 points and finished in third place. But when he requested his own evaluation sheets electronically to the data box, he did not receive them. He was told that he could come and see them in person by appointment.

Why? This is perhaps the most interesting question of the entire story.

What can a public authority be afraid of when it sends an electronic copy of a document whose existence it confirms to the applicant? Why should a citizen travel to the office and look at the material under supervision, when he requested an electronic copy and the law expressly provides for the electronic provision of information? If the document contains other people's data, it can be anonymized. If there is a legal reason not to provide the document, the authority has the opportunity to issue a decision and legally justify its action.

The worst option is something in between: the document exists, you won't get it, the rejection decision won't either, but you can come and see it.

That's not transparency. That's an administrative smokescreen.

The response to the request for a record of the meeting of the Council of the Region is just as strange. The applicant explicitly asked not only about the minutes, but also about any audio recording, written record of the discussion or other document capturing the discussion. Response? Registration is online. What about other records? Do they exist? Don't they exist? Were they taken? The answer to that is silent.

It is here that the ordinary story of one failed tender becomes a matter of public interest.

The Central Bohemian region does not operate with a private company of one owner. It manages public institutions, public money and public power. Directors of regional contributory organizations decide on important budgets, personnel and the quality of public services. The transparency of their selection is therefore not a whim of a curious applicant. It is a basic requirement of a trustworthy self-government.

No one is arguing that the third-place candidate should have automatically won the position. Nothing of the kind gives rise to a legal claim. Also, no one can claim without evidence that the selection process was rigged.

But that is precisely why it is so incomprehensible why there is so much reticence around the documents.

If everything was in order, then the publication of legally accessible and anonymized documents should be the best way to end any doubts. If the commission acted correctly, the documents will clear it. If the County Council had a legitimate reason not to appoint anyone, the documents explain it. If the highest-ranked candidate resigned and the commission subsequently recommended repeating the entire procedure, there is no reason to hide this simple sequence of events behind a few mutually unclear sentences.

The less the public administration explains, the more room it itself creates for suspicion.

And so, in the end, the question is not only about one selection procedure in Mladá Boleslav. He asks something bigger: how transparently does the Central Bohemian Region really choose the leadership of its organizations?

And most importantly: why is it sometimes easier to offer a candidate a chair in the office and the opportunity to "look" than to send him a document that has long existed?

Maybe the region is not afraid of anything at all. But then it's high time to prove it.

Not a press phrase. Not by linking to a general site page. Not an invitation to a personal inspection, but documents.

Source:

Supreme Administrative Court (2022)Judgment of 6 December 2022, No. 7 As 50/2022-48. Brno: Supreme Administrative Court. Available from:NSS search engine – 7 As 50/2022-48  

Czech Republic (1999)Act No. 106/1999 Coll., on free access to information, as amended. Available from:Act No. 106/1999 Coll.

Central Bohemian Region (2026)Processing of the request for the provision of information No. 126591/2026/KUSK dated 9/9/2026, sp. stamp SZ_126591/2026/KUSK, InfZ 260/26. Prague: Regional Office of the Central Bohemian Region. In this document, the region mentions, among other things, the existence of a point evaluation, the order of applicants and the possibility of personal inspection of the evaluation sheets.